Book
Mistakes to run with / Yasuko Thanh.
A devastatingly honest memoir that reckons with the past in order to ask whether the things that happen to us - and the choices we make - dictate the people that we become. This book chronicles the turbulent early years of the author's life, from a rough childhood to her teen years as a sex worker to her emergence as a writer. Growing up in a housing project in Victoria, BC, Thanh rebels against her extremely religious parents. Alternating between living on the streets and in foster homes, she acquires a taste for drugs and alcohol and learns unlikely lessons about sex, power, and friendship. It's the act of writing that ultimately becomes a solace from her suffering.
Record details
- ISBN: 9780735234413 (paperback)
- Physical Description: 257 pages ; 21 cm
- Publisher: Toronto : Hamish Hamilton Canada, 2019.
- Copyright: ©2019.
Search for related items by subject
| Subject: | Thanh, Yasuko. Thanh, Yasuko > Childhood and youth. Authors, Canadian (English) > British Columbia > Biography. |
Available copies
- 18 of 18 copies available at BC Interlibrary Connect. (Show)
- 1 of 1 copy available at Grand Forks and District Public Library.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 18 total copies.
Other Formats and Editions
Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grand Forks | BIO 813.6 THA (Text) | 35142002669215 | Biography | Volume hold | Available | - |
- Penguin Putnam
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
âOn rare occasions, you read a book that gives you the sense it had to be written, that the impulse to get these words on the page was more about necessity than choice. Books such as those are full of passion, pain and urgency, and offer the kind of triumph you feel lucky to witness. Mistakes to Run With is one such bookâit feels driven by the compulsion to document, by the urgent human desire to be heard. And when every detail has been shared, every unvarnished truth thoughtfully relayed, Thanh makes you want to stand up and cheer the accomplishment.â âThe Globe and Mail
âBold, brave, and engrossing. . . . Thanhâs survival is story of sheer will and one that will keep you riveted to the page.â âVancouver Sun
In her extraordinary and inspiring memoir, Yasuko Thanh, once a teenager living on the street manipulated into sex work and now an award-winning author, chronicles her path from trauma and addiction to finding her voice and finding her way.Â
Mistakes to Run With chronicles the turbulent life of Yasuko Thanh, from early childhood in the closest thing Victoria, BC, has to a slum to teen years as a sex worker and, finally, to her emergence as an award-winning author. As a child, Thanh embraced evangelical religion, only to rebel against it and her equally rigid parents, cutting herself, smoking, and shoplifting. At fifteen, the honour-roll runaway develops a taste for drugs and alcohol. After a stint in jail at sixteen, feeling utterly abandoned by her family, school, and society, Thanh meets the man who would become her pimp and falls in love.
The next chapter of her life takes Thanh to the streets of Vancouver, where she endures beatings, arrests, crack cocaine, and an unwanted pregnancy. The act of writing ultimately becomes a solace from her suffering. Leaving the sex trade, but refusing to settle on any one thing, Thanh forges a new life for herself, from dealing drugs in four languages to motherhood and a complicated marriage, and emerges as a successful writer.
But even as publication and awards bolster her, she remains haunted by her past.
